FC Barcelona can reach a huge landmark in the Champions League by beating Shakhtar Donetsk at the Montjuic Stadium on Wednesday.
The Blaugrana currently nurse a 100% record at the top of Group H in 2023/2024 following wins over Royal Antwerp and Porto.
By seeing off their Ukrainian foes in Catalonia this week, Xavi Hernandez’s men will have one foot in the knockout stages after back-to-back failures to reach the knockout phase in Europe’s elite club competition over the past couple of seasons.
Barca are severely depleted for the fixture, which is particularly worrying with El Clasico against Real Madrid on the near horizon.
For the latest installment of the world’s biggest derby, they will be unable to call on the likes of Pedri, Robert Lewandowski, Frenkie de Jong and Raphinha in a tie that could decide where the La Liga title ends up come late May.
Before that, though, Barca must focus on the task at hand on the continent. By picking up three points for the third time in the UCL this term, they will also reach a huge landmark.
This is because winning will grant the Blaugrana a 200th victory across the European Cup and its modern-day successor the Champions League.
They have 199 victories thus far – 26 of which came in the old format of the competition where they played 46 games and 173 in the Champions League where they have run out on 295 occasions for a combined total of 341.
Barca made their debut in Europe on September 3, 1959 when they played against local team CDNA Sofia in Bulgaria.
As the match ended in a 2-2 draw, they had to wait until the 23rd of that month for their first triumph in continental competition by beating the Bulgarians 6-2 to advance to the next round.
Unable to go all the way in that edition of the European Cup, however, they were turfed out by bitter rivals Real Madrid in the semi-finals.
As we know, Barca had to sit patiently until 1992 to conquer Europe for the first time when the tournament had already changed to the Champions League.
In the wake of Ronald Koeman’s free kick ending Sampdoria’s dreams at Wembley, glory a lot closer together came in 2006, 2009, 2011 and 2015.
